Fall 2008, Volume 25.1

Poetry

Liz Waldner

Liz Waldner is the author of several poetry collections, with poems current or forthcoming in Poetry, New American Writing, The Journal, and The New Yorker. Her collection, Trust, won the Cleveland State University Poetry Center Open Competition and will be published in early 2009. Together with Kamyar Arasteh, she also provided the translations of Forough Farrokzhad’s poetry appearing in this issue.

A Shady Little Pain

With my lunch came
an empty jar labeled nuance;

I opened it and poured it
on my little plate.

(I’m a Sagittarian;
moderation not for me.)

There was nothing I could ‘taste and see’
yet there’s a feeling that I ate

Reminds me of my sleepless night,
clouds incandescent with the moon,

And me with missing you—
what can nuance do?

Nuage in French is cloud
cloud in sky is breath

Breath in ear is heaven near
when yours is what I hear

But the sound on leaves of steady rain:here’s only lunch again today.

A Shorter History of Impetus

The hour comethAnd almost now is
I leave againYou do not cry
I pack and unpack and pack and unpackAnd I look for the next affordable room
It is boring to state fact soState bird, state flower, so again
Afraid even the sentence will run out like the roof so revisit old sentenceA timed crime
There thereWhere where
The paint will peel here without youDid some blistering thought assist?
No but you participated in your now as you couldWhich was that of the two month dwelling
And the toaster with a sign stating how exactly it doesn’t workMy toast this morning was delicious
Perhaps you will follow it to GermanyAnd chew its homeland twelve ways?
DiscipularScapular
CrepuscularUnfortunate word
I agree but such a thing never damaged by its signifierIs there love (‘the beautiful parsley’) signifying for me? some home?
We have to watch and see

Tender is The Knight

He rode in on an Adirondack sort of garden chair, I’d have to say
if I had to say something about how he arrived.

Also, it’s a matter of how he arrives inside: he comes straight to my heart
through my eyes. His gaze provides a way through the maze—

The maze of— is it longing? Or merely being
all one’s habits of being?

That maze amazing in its opacity
tenacity ubiquity—

Decide: so it’s habit, not longing which is rather a clear running stream
and direction

or an arrow imagining its flight to its destination
quite clear—

Quite clear: I ceased to be sole when he arrived—
He was hidden inside—

And inside himself hidden again, his Muktananda:
"It is better to love me there."

Within the city of Brahman which is the body, there is the heart,
and within the heart there is a little house.

A little horse eating the garden there beside his chair, so happy
when he strokes my hair, I live somewhere.

Who’s who, tender reader, tender grass, tender arrival, is up to you.
Tender under I mean unto. Render unto please her as you do.

Love is the armor you see yourself in, and also through.
Quixote’s knight of the moon-shaped mirror, not here.

Quester at rest. Mission accomplished.
Love bade me sit and eat.

The Adirondacks are not far from me here who is now far from you there
where is that chair.

So quietly you came to me.
Shudder, tremble, awake, aware.

O Lord of the night-blooming jasmine, you quest in the arrow of my longing,
the marrow of my being.

From who can hardly wait to be seen by you again, one
to meet in the heart, little house, only home